Sometimes, it’s all about your perspective

Jeff Burkhart, seen on Thursday, Sept. 6, 2012 in Novato, Calif., has written a book, “Twenty Years Behind Bars," about his experiences as a longtime bartender and nightclub owner in Marin County. (Frankie Frost/Marin Independent Journal)

I recognized him from somewhere. This happens to me all the time. People recognize me outside of work. They know they know me, they just don’t know from where. I usually tell them. But this was different. I knew him from somewhere, I just didn’t know where. Did he come into my current place of work? A previous workplace? When you meet hundreds of people a week, putting it all together can be a little daunting.

I tried to put it together while I sat on a padded bench at my local gym looking at a guy in the mirror whom I thought I knew.

One of the great things about working the night shift is having your days free. During the day, things are a bit different than they are at night. For instance, I haven’t made reservations for a restaurant or stood in line at a movie for a long time. It’s almost like taking a vacation at an off time of year every day.

I continued to sit, my headphones on, waiting for the guy next to me to finish with the 30-pound dumbbells. The other guy sat on his own padded bench listening to his own music and looking at his own cellphone while those 30 pounders sat at his feet.

I looked at my own cellphone, the 25-pound dumbbells from the rack sitting at my own feet. We could have been twins, except for the 5-pound weight difference.

Two minutes went by and he hadn’t done one set. I had run out of things to look up on my phone and was now looking around the gym.

The overly talkative guy — the one every gym has — had cornered some woman on the StairMaster. As she sweated and stepped he talked and talked.

I looked back at the guy sitting on his bench not 3 feet away. He still hadn’t done a set. Not one! I think I shook my head. I had finished my last set of exercises and only had two sets to do. All I needed was 30-pound dumbbells.

I noticed him noticing me noticing him. It looked like he shook his head.

The nerve of some people.

In the bar business I caution people not to let other people know they are waiting. Once it is known that you are waiting for their seats, you will almost always wait longer. I’m not sure exactly why this is, I just know that it is. People are just that way. From then on, I did my best not to let him know I was waiting.

Two songs later and he was still sitting there. He had moved the weights around twice, but still hadn’t done a set. I looked at the rack against the wall. The only two sets of weights missing were his and mine. And there we sat, side by side.

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I figured he now knew I was waiting and was deliberately taking his time. I guessed that by the way he kept looking over at me when he thought I wasn’t looking.

On and on it went. Odd how headphones and cellphones have changed the way people interact. Two people can sit in almost exactly the same spot at exactly the same time doing exactly the same thing, but have no shared experience at all. I see it every day in the bar business.

But there I was, sitting next to someone else and both of us were wearing headphones. The irony was not lost on me.

What was this guy doing, I thought, feeling the anger well up inside me. If there is something I can’t stand it is passive-aggressiveness. I couldn’t believe this was happening.

Some people, right?

I couldn’t wait any longer. I put my weights back on the rack. As I left the gym I saw him exchange his weights for mine. Apparently, he had been waiting for me the whole time.

Leaving me with these thoughts:

• I later realized that he was a waiter from the restaurant down the street from my house.

• “The qualities in others which most strongly bug me are qualities I possess myself,” wrote Charles McCabe, the legendary San Francisco Chronicle columnist.

• All the other people standing around waiting in the bar (or at the gym) are wanting or waiting to do the same thing as you. You are no better or worse than they are.

• “There are no facts, only interpretations,” Friedrich Nietzsche said.

Jeff Burkhart is the author of “Twenty Years Behind Bars: The Spirited Adventures of a Real Bartender” and an award-winning bartender at a local restaurant. Follow him at jeffburkhart.net and contact him at jeff@thebarflyonline.com.

About the Author

Jeff Burkhart is the author of “Twenty Years Behind Bars: The Spirited Adventures of a Real Bartender” and an award-winning bartender at a local restaurant. Reach the author at jeffb@thebarflyonline.com
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